Friday, March 19, 2010

Award for homophobic nonsense 2010

A US general says that the presence of gay soldiers had contributed to the Bosnian massacre.

You may have heard before that gay people ruin "the family". You may be used to accusations that they are "predatory", "promiscuous" and "perverted". Or you may have overheard religious figures saying that that homosexuality is "unnatural".

In the Eighties, the right-wing press dubbed AIDS "the gay plague". Elaine Kellet Bowman, a Conservative backbencher, told the House of Commons that she was proud to be "intolerant of evil". In the late Nineties, a brand of arse paper known as the Sun notoriously accused a "gay mafia" of plotting to take over the government.

But I'm sure this is the first time gay people have been held responsible for a genocide, no less.

In 1995, Bosnian Serb forces massacred 8,000 civilians in the town of Srebrenica.

Yesterday people heard this was at least partly due to homosexual Dutch soldiers. According to a former NATO commander, retired US general John Sheehan, their presence in Srebrenica contributed to the "weakening" of the military and "poor morale". "It was part of the problem", Sheehan said to a Senate Armed Services Committee.

5 comments:

Obviously the homosexuality had more to with it than the fact that there were only 450 Dutch soldiers against an overwhelmingly large force. If they were heterosexual, clearly they would have give 'em a run for their money!

Aside from the homophobic aspects, this is yet another time when the forces of conservatism seem to wish to rewrite recent history to fit their own prejudices.

Gen. Sheehan is clearly onto something here. No doubt these limp-wristed Dutch troops are also a bunch of dope fiends and are likely collaborating in the Afghan opium trade.

This is the only possible explanation as to why the coalition have failed to turn Afghanistan into a Modern Western Democracy(TM) safe for international monopoly capitalism to step in and make all the Afghani people happy and content.

Pure utter nonsense from this General. There was a widely held view amongst the British Army that allowing openly gay men to serve would undermine moral. I admit myself I held that view and it was stupid. The Army is conservative and many are wary of it being tinkered with. Not least as if the Army fails to do its job due to poor morale the outcome can be catastrophic.

That said Labour was right to overturn the ban. The changes have brought no harm and it was ludicrous to criminally investigate and persecute people on the basis of consensual relationships. That actually happened up until the late 90's quite shameful.

On a separate note many joked how the more macho parts of the Forces (Paras and Marines in particular)seemed to have more than a fair share of closeted individuals. A reverse psychology at work. Yet some evidence bears that theory out. And as to the Spartans in antiquity times....